Booking.comReviews 4,267

You can be charged for a room before you even arrive at the place. We found out the hard way. We booked a room with "special conditions", that meaning that you cannot cancel this room once you book it unless you give 30 days notice. We booked less than a week before, but they STILL charged us the cost of the full reservation, even with 2 days cancellation notice. Read the fine print, not all hotels book the same way. booking.com does not make this information clear at all. Makes me feel unsafe when traveling, like thieves are allowed to steal from you with this site.

We finally got some of our money back no thanks to bookings.com. I will not be using them again. Best to jsut find hotels on there then contact the hotel yourself, better and at least you will find out the hotel policy.

Although I cancelled a booking WELL within the cancellation period, my credit card was billed for the stay. When my credit card was refunded, it was less than the original amount charged due to exchange rate fluctuations. Of course, it went in the property's favor. If the property had waited until the CANCELLATION DATE to bill, there would not have been a problem. Booking.com's response?
"The property is not liable for this loss, because they had the right to take the deposit and for understandable reasons they can't and should not refund you more then they have received."

Thanks for nothing, booking.com

I reserved a hotel in San Francisco 6 months in advance. The advertisement said that I could book now and pay later. The full amount ($1200) was charged to my card immediately. The reservation also stated that I could not cancel or make changes. Two months after booking, I received an email stating that the hotel canceled my reservation. In order to receive a refund, I would need to provide a bank statement showing that I had been charged for the stay. I have provided this twice with all personal bank information blocked out and only the last digits of the card info and the actual charge showing. Booking.com still insists that this is not enough proof to provide a refund. I asked that they contact the hotel directly to confirm the charge and amount, and they are unwilling to do so. I will not use this site again for travel.

We purchased a new Ford Freestyle in 2004. In 2008 the transmission failed and Ford said it was out of warranty because it was more than 36 months old even though it only had ******* miles on it.
Ford also said there were no recalls onthe car pertaining to transmissions. The dealer charged me $2200 to repair it.
The following april ford sent me notice of a recall on the transmission. Since I had it repaired Ford said send a copy of the receipt and they would reimburse me. I sent the information they requested and they sent me $1435. It seems the dealer overcharged quite a bit.
Ford balkegd at any additional payments.
One year later the transmission failed again and Ford said there were no recalls. The dealer charged me $1800. Ford refused any additional payments claiming now that any thing additional would have to come from the dealer. *******@aol.com

On the booking.com website they show the room price for $79.99 and the tax "TAX(12%" included $9.60".
When I rented the room they charged additionally for tax total being $89.59. Tax was not included. I received a confirmation email with the same information.:(
I called customer support and spoke with the rep and his manager. They both agreed their the website wording and pricing. They still refused to refund the miss charged tax amount.:(

I hope other's see this review before they rent from booking.com

They state they have a low price guarantee, but they do not. I booked a hotel room with them, then checked on the hotel website before my trip for directions, and saw that the room's standard cost is considerably less expensive than the price booking has. I wrote booking with the information. I received an answer stating the low price guarantee does not apply for reasons 1 (inform booking after checking in), 2 (lower price is due to reward points), and 3. Price advertised is not for same room, not for those dates, etc. I replied stating that neither 1,2, or 3 applied and that I would like them to honor the low price guarantee. I received another answer two days later with a screen shot that shows the price the same as booking's on the hotel's website. Only thing is, it was a screenshot from ANOTHER hotel and the price "list" was from 2014. I wrote them back again, and so far... nothing.
Update: received an email from booking offering me to reimburse the difference. Waiting for details...

Booking.com receives no stars in my book. I booked a hotel through them and one month before my trip I receive an email stating that my trip was canceled and showed a zero balance. I had already paid up front for this trip and had not canceled. When I called they said that the hotel had gone out of business and that I had to prove that I'd paid the balance. It took several weeks before I got my money back and this was after sending my statements proving the charges. They had no problem taking the money...

This is by far the worst booking.com reservation online service. I should have read the reviews before ever involving myself with them... Their representatives are clueless. Management is rude and even more clueless.

I was told two weeks ago when I canceled my reservation and the money was taken from account that it would be a week or two before I'd see any money.

A week or two later I'm being told a whole different story... We couldn't get a hold of the hotel or they had to see your bank statement... Just ploys to keep my money... and I still my money has not been reimbursed.

I told them my money should never have been taken in the first place and that's how I understood the booking process... You pay if you show up the day of the reservation and they take you money at that time.

I was called a liar... That's what the hotel stated... so all those hotels that say book now pay later was all in my imagination?

So I've been called a liar, lied to, and still my money, almost a $1,000 is still unaccounted for. The hotel doesn't want to give it back... Booking.com doesn't want to give it back...

Now what do I do... hire a laywer?

Please, please, please, anyone who reads this stay away from this booking site... horrible!

Anonymous guest reviews given with no thought for the hotel. It is just bad for everyone concerned we are seriously thinking dropping booking.com for having anonymous reviews of our establishment or any establishment. How do we know that they are real reviews because they say that they are? What a load of crap if you cant put your name to it then do not review it. What are you afraid of an email asking a question. That you can trash if you like how can a hotel improve on themselves if you just give a rating without being subjective.we the hotel are not anonymous

We booked a hotel in Ocean City, Md. Had a serious problem with young college partiers all night. We contacted booking.com who was not very helpeful. We ended up threatening to contact American Express and reverse the charge. We finally got a refund. We left a professionally worded & honest review but booking.com scrubbed our review from the hotel website.
Then we looked at the actual motel website and found out that the motel was offering less expensive prices than booking.com. We sent booking.com an email and screenshot of the hotel's website pricing showing a lower price and asked please for the difference because booking.com has a "Best Price Guarantee" and we were given a run around. Finally contacting American Express got us the difference in a refund.

MY RECOMMENDATIONS:
1) Always use a credit card NOT a debit card to book your reservation. When you have a problem you can always file a dispute with your credit card company to get a refund if booking.com does not respond with a satisfactory reply to your complaint. Be sure to file your complaint within 30 days after you receive your bill. If you book your reservation using a debit card it is like using cash they have your money, and you have no recourse.

2) Do not believe the pictures that are posted. In our case, the pictures of the motel room look nothing like the actual room, ( or any other room in the hotel) there was NO ocean view as shown in the picture. I believe that the picture was from a different property because the hotel is not Oceanfront and the ocean could never be seen from any angle.

BOTTOM LINE:
In my experience, booking.com was a very poor reservation site, will not be using them again.

Please mark this review helpful to assist other readers. Thanks!

Attention Julio and Mr Terry.

From: Kristina Christie <*******@lawrencelawry.co.uk>
Subject: ******* Attention Tom
Date: 28 April 2015 15:16:38 BST
To: *******@homeaway.co.uk

Hello Tom,
Thanks for your time today.
Just to recap the following are the issues with the property *******.

The manager, owner was very slow in responding to any email or telephone queries.
The photographs that were sent me were a compilation of photos of a variety of apt and villas rented by this agent.
The apartment was not clean and light bulbs were out in the master shower room.
The door to the shower room was broken.
The stove/hob was broken.
The kitchen was not as advertised, fully equipped. It did not have a cooker or a kettle or a coffee maker. The BBQ was dangerous and broken.
There were no sea views as advertised and the private beach access did not exist.
Most importantly, the master bedroom external door was broken and would not lock.
The handy men who arrived to look at eh glass door did not have tools nor the parts required to make the door secure. Neither man was interested in looking at the hob as they were not electricians. Nothing further could be done until Monday. We arrived on a Friday and our flight home was on Weds.
I told Clara, one of Julios employees, that we would be leaving and moving into a hotel as we could not stay in a flat that was not secure. She indicated that she understood.

In terms of unauthorised payments on my card there were three. Two for 235 Euros and a further for 200 euros but I would like a full refund as the property was not as advertised at all.

I have forwarded you the emails where Mr Terry and Julio have agreed to transfer funds into my account, and request my details but as of today no monies have arrived.

Cheers,
Kristina Christie

Using Booking.com has made planning a holiday nice and smooth. Look forward to using it for our next holiday

The customer service was ridiculous. They were giving form answers that didn't even match what we were talking about, but they were happy to make me pay twice for sub par accommodations (turns out the only "Reviews" of the hotel on the site were fake). It's just been a terrible dragged out and expensive experience thanks to them.

Everybody know that booking got the opportunity to book with credit card and without... what happen when you book with CC? Do you know that booking.com send directly to the Hotel ALL you credit card details? Do you know that if you are an hotel owner and you don't have a POS station for insert the credit card data of the customer that booking provide you yo don't have any guarantee to get paid by the customer if they don't show up? Do you know that booking.com make you pay commission also on the non show booking if the person that placed the booking lie to them and say that he did checked in in the hotel? Do you know that booking.com is totally a $#*!? I used 3 year agoda.com (and still use it) and in 3 years I've got 3 non show, after one month in booking.com, 4 non show and a review written by one of this non show i say it again, booking.com is $#*!!